Blood Fugue (21 page)

‘Did you see that?’ asked Carla.

‘Yes, like a phosphorous flare,’ said José.

Maria busied herself with tidying items of cookware and cutlery, ignoring the conversation.

‘Do you see how the whole clearing seems to be lit from the inside?’ continued José.

The children nodded. The glow was very faint, especially with the camping lantern still on to provide light to eat by, but they could see it faintly all around them like barely lit purple neon.

‘Some trick of nature no doubt,’ said José. ‘but very beautiful, nevertheless.’

Maria ignored him.

‘Children, I want you both up early, ready to pack and leave at first light. The earlier the better. Your father may stay a little longer and then follow us. It is up to him.’

When she’d tidied the plates away and rinsed them with a little of the water they had, she was first into the tent to change and take up her position for sleep. Carla followed, then Luis.

José spent a little longer sitting alone in the strange light of the clearing with the lantern off so that he could appreciate it better. A mist came up, creeping along in a thin layer next to the ground and he felt suddenly exhausted. He took off his boots, slipped into the tent and fell asleep with his clothes on. As he slipped into unconsciousness, he thought he heard faraway laughter.

Luis was the first to wake and see that Carla was gone.

He looked over at the shapes of his parents in their sleeping bags and their slack, inanimate faces and smiled. He preferred them that way. Taking care not to wake them he unzipped the tent flap, crawled out into the early morning light and zipped the flap shut again. He assumed Carla had gone to look for her binder before mama could catch her at it and he strolled in that direction in his unlaced boots to check.

He found the charm straight away, lying in the dirt near the border of undergrowth that marked the edge of the arbour. He picked it up, his theory about his sister temporarily quashed, and put it in his pocket next to his own. Perhaps she had become tired of waiting for their parents to wake up and had gone to explore the tree again or look a little further afield for great grandfather Jimenez’s resting place.

He leaned over to tighten the laces of his boots ready to go and look for her. One thing that gave him great pleasure was knowing that his parents had overslept in spite of everything they’d said the night before. Mama had especially annoyed him with her stupidity about the charm. As far as he was concerned she deserved to be the last out of bed and have to live with that fact after all her panicked crowing. He set off in the direction of the tree, still fascinated by its size.

Standing right beside the trunk was where he could see its greatness most strikingly. Even from the edge of the space it occupied, it looked unusually large, but within touching distance its size was frightening. The four of them with arms linked wouldn’t have reached halfway around it and though the trunk began to separate into branches no more than thirty feet overhead, each branch angled upward and outward further before forming the slightly domed canopy of limbs and leaves that shielded the entire clearing, apparently preventing any other plants from growing.

Its roots bulged like buttresses from its sides and tapered down towards the ground where they flattened out a little before disappearing into the earth. Luis wondered if there was a wind strong enough or lightning powerful enough to knock it over or kill it. He doubted it.

The bark of the tree was grey and there was no hint of moss or lichen on its surface. Beneath the bark, the contours of the wood were impressive and muscular. They hinted at an anatomy of unimaginably powerful strength. The bark reminded him of elephant hide and the massive and bunched shapes below were like the bulging sinews of some giant body builder. The way the roots spread into the ground and the branches into the air made him think of a huge disembodied forearm with a hand at each end. One hand gripped the earth with thick, unrelenting fingers while the other spread its digits skyward. Both ends seemed capable of clenching into a mighty fist.

After what had happened to Carla, Luis dared not touch the bark but he wanted to hurt the tree for hurting his sister. He thought of hacking into it with the machete and imagined that he would see real blood flow forth, that he would expose the vessels and living fibres that the bark hid. Somewhere inside, he mused, would be bones too, bones as thick as the trunks of ordinary trees.

Of the dimly glowing emanations they’d seen the previous night there was no sign. He ran back to the tent to collect the machete and heard hissed whispers from inside.

‘How could you oversleep like this, José?’

‘Don’t blame me for this, woman. If you didn’t wake up it’s your own fault. After all you said last night, it’s hardly the example to set for the children. They’re both up before you.’

‘Why can’t you support me in this? Why must you torment me? I was exhausted. I needed to sleep.’

‘You can tell that to Luis and Carla yourself when you see them. I’m going for a piss.’

While his father fumbled out of his sleeping bag and tried to open the zip door of the tent, Luis ran silently to the back of the tent and as far away as he could before his father emerged. Then he turned and pretended to be sauntering towards the camp, looking all the while into the undergrowth. It wasn’t until after José had relieved himself, just a few yards from the tent, that he noticed Luis dawdling along.

‘Morning, Luis.’

‘Morning, papa. Sleep well?’

‘Too well, apparently.’

‘What time do you think mama will want to leave?

‘Very soon I expect. Why don’t you help me pack some of these things up?’ José glanced around. ‘Where is your sister?’

‘She was up before me. I haven’t seen her yet.’

‘Well how long have you been awake?’

‘Not long. A few minutes perhaps. She’s probably gone into the woods to go to the toilet. Scared we’ll hear her farts or something.’

Luis laughed but only for a moment. Maria emerged from the tent and he could see she wasn’t happy.

‘Why didn’t you wake us up, Luis?’

‘You looked tired, mama. I didn’t want to disturb you.’

‘Well now I’m up. We’re late and I’m in a hurry so start packing.’

‘What about breakfast, Mama?’

‘There won’t be any breakfast for you if you don’t show some enthusiasm. I want to leave here as soon as possible.’

Between the three of them they had most of the equipment stowed in less than half an hour. The tent was the last thing to be packed away.

‘If Carla wants to change her clothes she’ll have to do it in the bushes,’ said José as he un-pegged the flysheet.

‘Go look for your sister, Luis.’ Said Maria. ‘I want to leave now, tell her.’

Luis ran, knowing that his mother’s mood was not going to improve. This would be a day of damage limitation. He jogged along the edge of the circular arbour calling into the brush. He glanced into the centre of the clearing from time to time to see if she was near the tree trunk but she wasn’t. Soon he was completing the circuit, coming back to where his parents stood with all the rucksacks packed up. They were waiting at the opening in the trees that led into the tunnel-path they’d made the previous day.

‘Is she coming, Luis?’ asked José.

‘She hasn’t answered me yet. I don’t know where she is.’

Maria’s look of determined unhappiness became one of concern.

‘Did you actually see her this morning, Luis?’

‘No, she was up before me.’

‘What time did you wake up?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Did you hear her get up?’

Luis shook his head, feeling the blame being put on him.

‘She could have been gone for hours,’ said Maria.

‘Let’s call for her again,’ said José. ‘All of us.’

They left the collection of brightly coloured canvas and Gor-Tex backpacks and walked together around the broad clearing shouting for Carla. They called loudly and their voices echoed in the wide space.

Half an hour of shouting into the surrounding woods yielded nothing. They walked back to the pile of camping gear and stood, arms folded and heads bent slightly downward, in a triangle.

‘We can’t leave her here,’ said José, ‘But, at the same time, we have to make a start for the car. If Carla really has wandered off or is lost or hurt, we need to organise help for her. Pass me the phone.’

Luis went to the pocket of the bag it was packed in and switched it on.

‘It’s no good, papa, look.’

José took the phone. The battery was almost dead but it hardly mattered; there was no signal. José sighed.

‘Okay, turn it off and save the battery. Maybe we can get a network nearer the town.’

‘José, what are we going to do?’ asked Maria.

‘We’re going to split up.’

‘What? No. Not possible.’ she said.

‘It’s our best chance of success. Someone stays here by the tree and waits for Carla to come back and the other two begin hiking back to the car. If Carla doesn’t return within some space of time that we all agree on, then that person also leaves and heads back.’

‘Can’t we just leave a note for her on a tree or something?’ asked Luis.

‘We could but there’s no guarantee that it wouldn’t blow away or get rained on. We could leave her a sign of some kind but she might not understand it. My plan makes sense. It’s difficult, but we have to do it and the quicker we get started the better. Whoever leaves takes the phone and gets help as soon as there’s a signal. Failing that, we can get help in Hobson’s Valley.’

‘Who has to stay?’ asked Maria.

‘I do. You and Luis set as quick a pace as you can and I’ll catch you up, hopefully with Carla.’

‘How long will you wait for her?’

‘Until tomorrow morning, unless you think otherwise.’

Maria considered it.

‘If she’s not back by then, what will you do?’

‘Chase you two as fast as I can. If she isn’t coming back, we know she has either decided to go back on her own or has run into some kind of. . .problem.’

‘I don’t like this plan, José. Not at all.’

‘Listen to me, Maria. I think the most reasonable explanation for her disappearance is that she was upset and decided to leave early, on her own, to frighten you. She wants to pay you back for treating her like a child. She wants to prove she is not a child any more. I expect that if you hurry you’ll find her an hour or two ahead of you on the Eastern Path, stomping back towards the car.’

‘I hope you’re right.’

‘I am.’ He gave Maria a kiss on the forehead and then a more tender one on the mouth before turning to Luis and taking him by the shoulders in a mock gesture of fatherly imperiousness. ‘Look after your mother, okay?’

‘Whatever, papa.’

‘You’d better get going.’

‘What about the extra back pack?’

‘We’ll take out everything except Carla’s stuff and share it out. I’ll carry it with me if she doesn’t come back here.’

José watched the dark tunnel of brush swallow his wife and son and listened to their footsteps and voices recede as they hurried back towards the Eastern Path. When they’d been gone half an hour he began to call for Carla again.

Chapter 23

Randall Moore took the cherry-handled .38 snub from its velvet-lined box and turned it over in his hands. The weight felt good and though it hadn’t been fired for a long time he could still smell the faintest hint of spent powder. The wood was warm against his palms, the black steel cold and unyielding.

He took a cloth and began to rub the gun over to remove any dirt and dust from the exterior. Then he released the chamber and spun it, eliciting a whisper of a whir that told stories of careful oiling, cleaning and maintenance. He smiled to hear the ease of the movement. Flicking the gun shut he took aim and pulled the trigger. There was an innocuous metallic snap that made him jump even though he knew the gun was empty.

In thirty-five years of retailing, no one had ever given him a single reason to use the gun. No robberies, no attempted break-ins at night, not even a case of shoplifting. That was the way it was out in the big country. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t in danger. Hobson’s Valley was a strange place. It had its secrets. Danger could walk in at any moment and he intended to be ready.

There’d been a rumour going round that Jimmy Kerrigan might be involved somehow with the disappearance of the two boys and now the Priestly girl. It didn’t surprise him one bit that the smug little city slicker was some kind of closet maniac. Randall was always glad when Kerrigan bypassed the store to shop at Olsen’s. The way he walked around trying to look like some kind of wise woodsman was a real insult to Randall’s intelligence. The guy was city and suit to the bone. Dressing like a hippy and living in that cabin like a hermit might fool a few folks but it didn’t fool him.

The guy had always been an outsider. Randall knew more about his adoption than Jimmy Kerrigan realised. He knew it was a ‘rushed job’ based on ‘local’ approaches to law. Wherever the man came from, he didn’t belong in the valley and never had.